Where Does Cliven Bundy STAND Today?
Today is the four-year anniversary of the protest in Bunkerville, Nevada, widely known worldwide as “The Standoff.” 
Recently, I spent the day with Cliven and Carol Bundy at their ranch. I had scheduled some time to come to the ranch attend a celebration of the dismissal of charges but those celebratory plans were quickly dashed as those who languish in lock-up were again brought to the forefront in the hearts of The Bundy’s. “I am not sure what we can do for ‘em,” says Cliven, as we bump down the desert ranch road in the April heat. “Engel and Burleson might have some chance,” referring to the post-conviction relief filings both men have in the motion. “But the ones who’d plead guilty I just don’t know what we can do,” shaking his head.
Cliven and Carol are not in the happiest of moods these days; the men left behind weigh heavy on each of them. “The thought of ’em men still living out their days in prison just breaks my heart.” Stopping the truck, we looked over the edge of the northbound bridge of Interstate 15 spanning the Toquah Wash where the famous standoff was held. Cliven described to me about what happened that day. Cliven is careful to be clear neither he or Carol were at the Toquah Wash on April 12, 2014. But, Cliven did see the evidence and discovery in preparation for his own trial, giving him great insight into the actions of all of the Bundy 19. Most he
only came to know in Federal Lock-up.
“Right here, this is as far as Todd had walked out on the bridge,” showing me a distance of approximately 35 feet. While I was in Pahrump with Todd Engel, almost a year ago he told me the story where he had just arrived and gotten out of his pickup when a lady had come running up the northbound bridge yelling that the protestors in the wash were being threatened to be shot. He had ran out to see what was going on, to get a better idea of the circumstances, curiosity really, he was just getting there after driving all night from Idaho. He stayed just a few minutes, maybe 20 minutes is all before he and the other men on the bridge saw the snipers on the Mesa targeting the protestors below. Todd also realized he and the other men, Scott Drexler and Eric Parker, were also targeted from those same ‘overwatch’ positions. Todd sprinted back up to the closest Sheriffs’ deputy to plea with the Sheriffs to intervene before the men, women, and children below in the wash were slaughtered. That deputy did heed Todd’s concern and notified his command of the precarious situation that was playing out.
Then Todd stayed off the bridge and out of target range for the remainder of the protest, helping the Nevada Highway Patrol
as they attempted to direct traffic and the crowds. Once it was over, and the federal agents left, Todd got in his pickup and drove to Mesquite, Nevada, and got a hotel room to get some much-needed sleep. The next day he drove back to Northern Idaho. Todd came to know only years later how close he had become to losing his life that day. The BLM Rangers had taken their safeties off and requested permission to fire upon the men on the bridge only to be ordered to stand down by the Sheriff’s department as they took control ordering federal agents to leave the area.
Todd Engel represented himself during his trial and was one of two men to be found guilty in the first trial in 2017. After spending the sum total of one and a half hours at the protest, the Federal Prosecutor is recommending 20 years for Todd to spend in prison; effectively giving him a life sentence. Most of that time at the standoff he spent with the highway patrol, which did collaborate his version of events during his trial. He never took his gun out of the low ready position, leaving it strapped to his chest or point it at anyone
Gregory Burleson was another latecomer to the protest that day. As we looked over the I15 bridge, Cliven showed me the route and position he took down into the Toquah Wash. “Burleson didn’t follow the road down like ‘em other protesters,” said Cliven pointing from behind the wheel of SUV we were sitting in. “He had climbed over the Jersey Barrier and took a more direct route into the Wash from the bridge. When he got down in dee wash, Ammon told Burleson to get back to the northbound bridge.” Ammon had assessed the danger and had told anyone with a rifle to retreat back and away from the center of the confrontation they surprising found themselves in. Greg Burleson did exactly as he was told. He got out of the confrontation and kneeled down, away from the Southern I15 bridge and where the Federal Agents took up the position to fire upon the crowd.
Burleson received a 68-year sentence for his participation that day. “He wasn’t found guilty because of what he did!” Cliven later editorialized. ‘He was found guilty for what he said after the FBI got him drunk and then interviewed him while pretend’n to be reporters,” referring to the undercover operation ‘LongBow Productions.’
Then there are the men who were forced into guilty pleas, Jerry Deleamus, Pete Santilli, Eric Parker, Scott Drexler and others who along with Engel and Buerlson. Had all the evidence been available to them and their courtroom jurors would have made very different decisions. Each of the Bundy 19 were under tremendous pressure, life-altering pressure, that is impossible to understand unless you have personally gone through it. It is how the federal government achieves a 97% conviction rate. It’s why nearly everyone who comes into contact with the federal justice system goes to prison, and for a very long time. Most Americans just assume that if you are a targeted by federal prosecutors you must have done something terrible and they are just really good at convicting the guilty. But, in reality, it’s the pressure and manipulation that the prosecution practices that land so many in prison, leaving the remaining who go to trial. And, when they do maintain their innocence they receive the ire of the prosecutors for challenging them, doling out ungodly long sentences like Burleson’s and Engel’s.
This is Cliven’s conviction today, on this anniversary: to see each man released and exonerated. After 650 days in prison, Cliven refused to accept the pre-trial release for himself offered by Judge Navarro until every one of the Bundy 19 was released. It was only after all the charges were dismissed against him, did he leave those men behind still in lock-up. “This thing isn’t over. The fight I have today is to see each of these men home with their families and all the charges dropped.” Shaking his head resolutely. “How can I be happy, how can I celebrate my own release, when so many who came to STAND with me are still in prison? How can I not still STAND with them now?”
About Michael Stickler
Mike is an author, radio host, ex-felon, and a highly sought after motivational speaker.
In “Cliven Bundy: American Terrorist Patriot”, author Michael Stickler went behind the razor wire of a federal detention center for 60 days to get Bundy’s real story. (ClivenBundy.net)
To find out the true story of Cliven Bundy, get his new book “Cliven Bundy American Patriot”.
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The thing is this, the US Constitution – those that SERVE WITHIN our governments Supreme contract – REQUIRES in writing that those who SERVE WITHIN our governments – state and general (federal) use the Militia of the several states to…
— Enforce the US Constitution (Supreme Law of this land, Supreme Contract for all who serve within our governments) and each state’s Constitution (highest Law of the state EXCEPT in the rare instances where it conflicts with the US Constitution, and highest Contract for all who serve within the state gov.,
— Enforce and keep the “Laws of the Union” (which are constitutional laws ONLY),
— Protect the country against all enemies both domestic and foreign, and
— “to suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions”.
So those agencies are not supposed to exist, nor be used for the purpose they were there for.
Also the US Constitution requires that all judges use “Good Behaviour” if they want to stay in office. Good Behavior is doing their duties as constitutionally laid out in writing for them, take and KEEP their Oath. Not much to ask for one to stay for life in that position is it?
Removing the judges for not using good behavior requires that the PEOPLE use a couple of their tools, a *Grand Jury investigation into that judge’s background and decisions, and if decided the evidence is enough, then a *Grand Jury Trial called up by the people so that the judge can make their own case and face their accusers.
The main thing is this, the US Constitution also says exactly in writing within the supreme contract what land they own, what land and for what purpose they may buy from the states. It is very clear to any who would bother to read it.
Remember that our government is NOT a “Democracy”, it is a Constitutional Republic. That our Allegiance is to the US Constitution and to our state Constitutions NOT to any office or branch of the government.
Mark Twain: “For in a Republic, who is “the country?” Is it the Government which is for the moment in the saddle? Why, the Government is merely a servant – merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn’t. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them.”
Harry Browne, 1996 USA presidential candidate, Libertarian Party: “…The Bill of Rights is a literal and absolute document. The First Amendment doesn’t say you have a right to speak out unless the government has a ‘compelling interest’ in censoring the Internet. The Second Amendment doesn’t say you have the right to keep and bear arms until some madman plants a bomb. The Fourth Amendment doesn’t say you have the right to be secure from search and seizure unless some FBI agent thinks you fit the profile of a terrorist. The government has no right to interfere with any of these freedoms under any circumstances.”
*Grand Jury – “The grand jury is mentioned in the Bill of Rights, but not in the body of the Constitution. It has not been textually assigned, therefore, to any of the branches described in the first three Articles. It is a constitutional fixture in its own right. In fact the whole theory of its function is that it belongs to no branch of the institutional government, serving as a kind of buffer or referee between the Government and the people”.
“Thus, citizens have the unbridled right to empanel their own grand juries and present “True Bills” of indictment to a court, which is then required to commence a criminal proceeding. Our Founding Fathers presciently thereby created a “buffer” the people may rely upon for justice, when public officials, including judges, criminally violate the law.” (Misbehavior, “Good Behaviour” requirement)
“The grand jury is an institution separate from the courts, over whose functioning the courts do not preside, we think it clear that, as a general matter at least, no such “supervisory” judicial authority exists. The “common law” of the Fifth Amendment demands a traditional functioning grand jury.”
“Although the grand jury normally operates, of course, in the courthouse and under judicial auspices, its institutional relationship with the judicial branch has traditionally been, so to speak, at arm’s length. Judges’ direct involvement in the functioning of the grand jury has generally been confined to the constitutive one of calling the grand jurors together and administering their oaths of office. The grand jury’s functional independence from the judicial branch is evident both in the scope of its power to investigate criminal wrongdoing, and in the manner in which that power is exercised.”
“The grand jury ‘can investigate merely on suspicion that the law is being violated, or even because it wants assurance that it is not.’ It need not identify the offender it suspects, or even “the precise nature of the offense” it is investigating. The grand jury requires no authorization from its constituting court to initiate an investigation, nor does the prosecutor require leave of court to seek a grand jury indictment. And in its day-to-day functioning, the grand jury generally operates without the interference of a presiding judge. It swears in its own witnesses and deliberates in total secrecy.”
“Recognizing this tradition of independence, we have said the 5th Amendment’s constitutional guarantee presupposes an investigative body ‘acting independently of either prosecuting attorney or judge”
“Given the grand jury’s operational separateness from its constituting court, it should come as no surprise that we have been reluctant to invoke the judicial supervisory power as a basis for prescribing modes of grand jury procedure. Over the years, we have received many requests to exercise supervision over the grand jury’s evidence-taking process, but we have refused them all. “it would run counter to the whole history of the grand jury institution” to permit an indictment to be challenged “on the ground that there was incompetent or inadequate evidence before the grand jury.” (Nor would it be lawful of them to do so.) Justice Antonin Scalia writing for the majority said In the Supreme Court case of United States v. Williams, 112 S.Ct. 1735, 504 U.S. 36, 118 L.Ed.2d 352 (1992)
We have allowed domestic enemies and traitors that serve within our governments to dumb us down.
Bertrand Russell,1953: “… Diet, injections, and injunctions will combine, from a very early age, to produce the sort of character and the sort of beliefs that the authorities consider desirable, and any serious criticism of the powers that be will become psychologically impossible…” (“The Impact of Science on Society”, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1953)
It doesn’t matter how much history, precedent, facts or logic and reason that is demonstrated to show the errors and crimes by judges, prosecutors, ‘law’ enforcement, bureacrats, voters and jurors. The fact is that those who claim to be the ‘government’ are levying all out criminal warfare on everyone who does not demand to be their slave and be happy about their slavery to their criminal racket.
The real solution is eternal extermination of authoritarians everywhere forever. No one has the balls to do it, few have the intelligence to understand how to succeed at it, and almost no one has the attention span to even discover it. The fact is that we are slaves as long as the criminal conspirators are breathing.
They gain while they injure us, we lose trying to remedy their injury to us while they gain even more during our pursuit of remedy. It is total slavery to criminals and every government employee and voter are the prime evil of this world. They can’t survive under a voluntary society, they must enslave us because violence is all they have offer the world – they are barbarians and it will not end until they are 100% exterminated from existence and the evolution of man is directed in a manner to delete authoritarianism from existence forever.
That’s how government rolls, a quota on convictions makes them look good. Doesn’t matter how they get the convictions. Big gov money pushes defendants into financial ruin, it becomes impossible to mount an effective defense. The Justice Department needs to be emptied out and honest attorneys brought in.